


Worthy of Wisdom

by RedNightmare14



Series: Ten Princesses [2]
Category: The Legend of Zelda & Related Fandoms, The Legend of Zelda (Video Game 1986)
Genre: Linked Universe (Legend of Zelda)
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-06-25
Updated: 2020-06-25
Packaged: 2021-03-03 22:20:24
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,144
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/24912991
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/RedNightmare14/pseuds/RedNightmare14
Summary: When war threatens her country, Zelda Dawn finds she cannot save her people. Their only hope is a hero, even if one has not been born in centuries.
Series: Ten Princesses [2]
Series URL: https://archiveofourown.org/series/1790002
Comments: 2
Kudos: 36





	Worthy of Wisdom

The sky is red this morning, as it always was, a warning sign of bad things to come according to some old poem. As if it could get any worse. Zelda sighed, rubbing the back of her hand where the mark of the Triforce of Wisdom lay. Her ancestor from long ago, the one who caused the state of her kingdom with his selfish whims and uneven heart, had inherited both the Triforces of Power and Wisdom from his father. But as the royal family’s power over their kingdom had waned, the Triforce of Power abandoned them as soon they reached some unknown divine tipping point that made them less powerful than Ganon.

Nobody was more powerful than Ganon, not the soldiers, or the people, or the princess – or, queen, Zelda supposes she is now, now that her father is dead. Killed in a foolish attempt to stop Ganon with an army unequipped to fight such an evil. It was no wonder the Triforce of Wisdom skipped him in their family line, going straight from her grandmother to her. He had left her without a full army to defend herself or her people. She was alone to face Ganon without a hero.

As the last of her line due to a curse placed on that foolish prince from oh so long ago, they now called her Queen Zelda, sixteenth of her name and ruler of Hyrule. Honestly, she wished she was Princess Dawn again, ruler of no one but her dolls that she played with in her nursery, acting out the legends from long ago.

It had been desperation that caused her to send her old nursemaid Impa out to search for a hero. She was expected to lead and win a war for a country that was impoverished and ill-prepared for an invasion of such magnitude, and with such a small army. Ganon’s forces were numerous and spread out across Hyrule, corrupting her people into the monsters that made it up until so few remained that hope was surely lost without a hero. The legends always say that a hero appeared when Hyrule needed him. So, a hero Zelda called for.

“My Queen, we must hurry. Ganon’s forces are breathing down our necks!” cried her advisor. An older man, loyal to her father and now her. He could wield a blade, which was why she requested he stay with her. He had agreed as he had no family to get back to.

“Yes, yes of course,” she responded. “Lead the way.”

Her advisor took her down a secret passageway that she didn’t even know existed before today. If she had been herself then she would have asked how old the passage was, but as it was her heart was not with her mind. It was heavy within her chest. She was sure this was the end of her kingdom. It had shrunk so small over the centuries since the Triforce of Courage was lost, with powerful lords and ladies declaring themselves independent until the kingdom was but a fraction of its former self centred around the Lost Woods where few dared to go.

Magic flowed from the Lost Woods, once protected by an unknown deity who had been lost to time. Whatever magic came from there now was sugar magic, the magic of fairies, who would heal people but could not fight. That was not their purpose.

The magic that came from the Triforce of Wisdom was also unsatisfactory for protecting her kingdom. It whispered to her advice on what to do, but couldn’t do anything else. The Triforce of Power gave its wielder the power necessary to act out their wishes within the laws of Nayru, but the Triforce of Wisdom only gave its wielder the wisdom necessary to figure out how to fulfil their wishes with their own might. Sometimes, wisdom was not enough. 

Her advisor stopped her before they exited the passage.

“There’s someone there, my queen,” he spoke in a low tone. “Stay here, I’ll protect you.”

He crept out of the passage brandishing his sword and out of Zelda’s sight. Silence reigned for several minutes before the clashing of swords began. Zelda pressed herself against the walls, praying with all her might that her advisor would survive. Her prayers were meant to have power, weren’t they? They should work now.

The sounds echoed into the passage. The grunts, the clashes of metal against metal, of a man defending queen and country. It felt like hours before the sounds stopped. Zelda counted to one hundred before daring to leave. She had no weapon, not even a knife. She had given it to her advisor to protect her with.

There was no one there. The hallway was bare with only a few lanterns lighting it. She took one and continued on her way. Even if she stayed in the passage the monsters would find her anyway. Her best chance was moving quickly, the voice from her Triforce piece whispered, and hoping that the monsters had gone the wrong way.

Hope was what the Triforce of Wisdom always landed on. She wondered if perhaps Nayru’s wisdom was lost to her Triforce piece. It never told her what to do, where her people where, why so many things were happening. It only gave her the here and now. Information she could have gotten herself. 

Did the other Triforce pieces have this limitation? Did Ganon’s Triforce of Power give him only the strength of a regular monster? She doubted it, if he was able to mount such an attack and corrupt so many of her people. Even the people from the other kingdoms were corrupted, so matter how far away they were. No one was safe from the red sky.

“Wisdom! Wisdom!” a raspy chant came from behind her.

She turned, already knowing what she would see. A group of Darknuts, twenty strong in blue armour not too dissimilar to that of the Hylian army’s, descended upon her. They did not attack, sensing an important person, but she now understood why her advisor had not returned.

“Wisdom! Wisdom!” they chanted, grabbing her hand that didn’t hold the Triforce’s mark. “Wisdom! Wisdom!”

They had limited language, but Zelda understood what they wanted. With the Triforce of Courage missing and with no hero in sight, the Triforce of Wisdom was the only thing standing in Ganon’s way. 

Two Darknuts grabbed each of her hands, with eight going in front of her and eight behind. The last two stood either side of the first two, forming a perimeter around her that she couldn’t escape from. They began to march, forcing her to move along with them, out of the castle entrance and onto the bridge over the moat.

She knew where she was headed. She didn’t need divine wisdom to tell her. When Ganon killed her, he would get the Triforce of Wisdom from her, then nothing could stop him. She couldn’t let that happen.

Please, she thought aloud in her mind, attempting to garner the Triforce’s attention. Find someone to protect you. Anyone. I can’t. I can’t.

She didn’t know if this would work. The Triforce wouldn’t tell her. Nevertheless, her hand began to burn and the Darknut holding it screeched in pain. Immediately, the procession stopped and all weapons were on her. She froze, silently bearing the pain emitting from her hand.

Not Wisdom. Not Wisdom. You are Not Wisdom.

Shocked, she froze for a different reason. She had never heard this voice before. It was distinctly female, though she did not recognise it, with an echo to it. The voice from before sounded like her and reminded her of her conscience from before she gained the Triforce from…her…

Her conscience. It was never the Triforce of Wisdom speaking to her. It was always her own wisdom. She had never been worthy of it.

The Triforce of Wisdom ripped itself from her body, leaving behind no blood but it still hurt, and hovered above her. It was beautiful, golden with a slight bluish tint to it. The Darknuts squabbled and jumped at it, brandishing their weapons as if it would fall to them. Zelda reached her hand up to it…

It broke. It broke into nine fragments and disappeared, leaving behind nothing, not even sparkles. Simply fading away.

Everyone froze. It was as if time had stopped. Zelda couldn’t find in herself to breathe. She had been but a placeholder for the Triforce, not worthy of its wisdom but granted it simply because she was given it by her grandmother.

How many of her ancestors had not been worthy of the Triforce? Was anybody living right now worthy of it? Was that why it broke? Or was it waiting for someone with the wisdom necessary to find it to claim it?

She didn’t know.

Zelda looked up at the rising sun. Dawn was approaching, the moon had faded from the sky and the last little stars were flickering out. She looked at the last star fighting against the coming light and closed her and wished upon it. It was not a shooting star, but Hyrule needed all the magic it could muster if it was to survive. Somehow, somewhere, a hero had to come and save them. She could only hope the magic was there.

-

Impa ran as fast as she could, avoiding the exposed roots where she would trip over with her old legs. She couldn’t keep this up for much longer, but she had to. The princess – the queen – needed her to find someone, anyone, capable of defending Hyrule from Ganon. But first, she had to find someone, anyone, who would save her from the Moblins currently chasing her down, baying for her blood to be split.

A spear shot past her, grazing her side as she fell to the ground. Impa attempted to rise again, but fell down when pain erupted from her ankle. She managed to twist herself onto her bottom but couldn’t move any more than that. She was a sitting Cucco.

The Moblins, their eyes and skin red, growled at her, their spears directed at her from a few metres away. Impa closed her eyes. It wasn’t courageous but she’s be darned if the last thing she ever saw was a flurry of weapons flying towards her.

A squeal sounded through the forests, joined by many more. Impa couldn’t dare open her eyes, if it was a battle cry she’d open them only to be impaled. 

The squeals continued. It must be a long battle cry. It went on for a very long time. If this was how long Moblin battle cries were, why did so many people find them difficult to beat? Then, she listened closely. 

The sounds of spears whizzing through the air, of dull clangs, of rocks against skin and metal. All of this was mixed in among the cries of dying enemies. Then, the cries stopped.

Impa opened her eyes. The Moblins all lay dead, further away from her than they had been when she fell. How…how did they die? Who saved her? There was no one there, the path was empty. 

“Okay?”

A young voice sounded from the trees. Impa looked closely at the foliage, barely able to make out a dirty child of maybe ten years wearing green hiding in the trees. His shield looked handmade, barely more than a piece of wood though it was the most noticeable thing he held, and in his hand was a rock. She glanced back at the dead Moblins, not able to keep her eyes on them for long since the caved-in heads of the Moblins made her nauseous, but she could see the rocks surrounding them. They had been bludgeoned to death.

The child jumped down from roughly fifteen metres up onto the ground, landing on his feet. He looked warily at her, picking up a Moblin spear and directing it at her.

“Okay?” he repeated. “Okay you?”

Impa nodded. The boy’s clothes were covered in blood. Not just his shoes from where he’d stepped in Moblin blood or his hands from when he’d picked up the spear. All his clothes were speckled with blood, like he’d been splattered with it recently. Impa realised in cold horror that he must have attacked the Moblins on the ground then climbed the tree to watch her.

His eyes were wild and dangerous. The spear was dull but sharp enough to kill. He could kill her at any moment.

He came closer, still holding the spear at her.

“Who you?”

Impa’s mouth was dry, her eyes were focused on the spear in front of her. “I-I,” she began, but she couldn’t finish her sentence. Everything went black as she fainted, the last thing she saw being the spear aimed at her, ready to impale her.

**Author's Note:**

> 'Hyrule Historia' (and I think the manual, but I can’t recall) says that 'The Adventure of Link' takes place six years after the original 'The Legend of Zelda'. The manual for 'The Adventure of Link' says that the mark of the Triforce of Courage appeared on Link’s hand on his sixteenth birthday, making him ten in his first game. However, Miyamoto in an interview says that Link is about 12 in 'The Legend of Zelda', so I’m guessing we have an 'Ocarina of Time' situation where one source says Link is 9 as a child and 16 as an adult while another says he’s 10 as a child and 17 as an adult. I’m making Hyrule 10 for his first game since it makes more sense according to the manual. If we went by Miyamoto, Hyrule would be 18 in his second adventure, but he isn’t since Miyamoto also says that he was 16 in 'The Adventure of Link'. A similar thing happened in 'The Wind Waker'. Age inconsistencies are Nintendo’s specialty.


End file.
